2022 Pacific Hurricane Season (The Chosen Wizard)
The 2022 Pacific Hurricane Season '''was the fourth most active Pacific hurricane season in recorded history, and was the most active in the East Pacific east of the 140th parallel since 2018. The reason for the extreme activity was due to an El Niño that began in late 2021 and continued throughout 2022. Not only did this El Niño contribute to unusual rainfall and droughts in different areas of the world, it also caused more hurricanes than usual in the Pacific Ocean. In fact, out of the 32 tropical depressions that formed, 25 became named, 16 of these storms became hurricanes, of which 10 became major hurricanes. This season is also known for having four Category 5 hurricanes (Estelle, Madeline, Orlene, and Winifred) , the most ever recorded in the basin (this record would be beaten again by the next season). Many records were beaten, some even shattered, this year. Mexico suffered 11 landfalls from tropical cyclones, including 5 of at least hurricane intensity, and 2 of at least Category 3 intensity. This shattered the previous record of 6 in 1971. One of these storms was Hurricane Winifred, which made the strongest landfall on record anywhere in the world. 2 storms (Ivette and Madeline) made hurricane strength landfalls in Hawaii, which had never happened before. Orlene would become the longest lasting storm to not cross into the Western Pacific, at 29 days. Two storms became both the costliest and 2nd-costliest hurricanes to hit Mexico: Paine in Baja California Sur, and Winifred along the Western Mexican Coast. Winifred became the strongest hurricane ever recorded as it made its record landfall in Manzanillo. It also became the costliest hurricane on record anywhere on the Planet Earth and the deadliest in the entire East Pacific basin. In the end, this season was the costliest on record for this basin, making the 2013 season look like nothing. Season Predictions and Timeline '''Timeline of tropical activity in the 2022 Pacific Hurricane Season ImageSize = width:700 height:220 PlotArea = top:10 bottom:80 right:20 left:20 Legend = columns:3 left:30 top:58 columnwidth:270 AlignBars = early DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy Period = from:01/05/2022 till:30/11/2022 TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal ScaleMinor = grid:black unit:month increment:1 start:01/05/2022 Colors = id:canvas value:gray(0.88) id:GP value:red id:TD value:rgb(0.38,0.73,1) legend:Tropical_Depression_=_<62_km/h_(<39_mph) id:TS value:rgb(0,0.98,0.96) legend:Tropical_Storm_=_63-88_km/h_(39-54_mph) id:C1 value:rgb(1,1,0.80) legend:Category_1_=_74–95_mph_(118–153_km/h) id:C2 value:rgb(1,0.91,0.46) legend:Category_2_=_96–110_mph_(154–177_km/h) id:C3 value:rgb(1,0.76,0.25) legend:Category_3_=_111–129_mph_(178–208_km/h) id:C4 value:rgb(1,0.56,0.13) legend:Category_4_=_130–156_mph_(209–251_km/h) id:C5 value:rgb(1,0.38,0.38) legend:Category_5_=_≥157_mph_(≥252_km/h) Backgroundcolors = canvas:canvas BarData = barset:Hurricane bar:month PlotData= barset:Hurricane width:10 align:left fontsize:S shift:(4,-4) anchor:till from:16/05/2022 till:20/05/2022 color:C2 text:Agatha from:10/06/2022 till:13/06/2022 color:TS text:Blas from:21/06/2022 till:01/07/2022 color:C1 text:Celia from:28/06/2022 till:30/06/2022 color:TD text:Four-E from:05/07/2022 till:20/07/2022 color:C4 text:Darby from:08/07/2022 till:28/07/2022 color:C5 text:Estelle from:10/07/2022 till:14/07/2022 color:C1 text:Frank from:13/07/2022 till:14/07/2022 color:TS barset:break barset:skip barset:skip barset:skip barset:skip barset:skip barset:skip barset:skip from:17/07/2022 till:22/07/2022 color:TS text:Georgette from:22/07/2022 till:22/07/2022 color:TD text:One-C barset:break from:23/07/2022 till:26/07/2022 color:TS text:Keli from:24/07/2022 till:28/07/2022 color:C3 text:Howard from:27/07/2022 till:11/08/2022 color:C4 text:Ivette from:29/07/2022 till:08/08/2022 color:C2 text:Javier from:05/08/2022 till:07/08/2022 color:TS text:Kay from:10/08/2022 till:10/08/2022 color:TD text:Three-C from:11/08/2022 till:15/08/2022 color:TS text:Lester from:14/08/2022 till:24/08/2022 color:C5 text:Madeline from:18/08/2022 till:23/08/2022 color:C1 text:Lala barset:break from:26/08/2022 till:29/08/2022 color:TS text:Newton from:27/08/2022 till:30/08/2022 color:TD text:Five-C from:31/08/2022 till:29/09/2022 color:C5 text:Orlene from:14/09/2022 till:20/09/2022 color:C4 text:Paine from:17/09/2022 till:21/09/2022 color:C2 barset:break barset:skip barset:skip barset:skip barset:skip from:24/09/2022 till:25/09/2022 color:TD text:Roslyn from:20/09/2022 till:23/09/2022 color:TS text:Seymour from:21/09/2022 till:22/09/2022 color:TD text:Twenty-E from:25/09/2022 till:27/09/2022 color:TS text:Tina from:28/09/2022 till:07/10/2022 color:C3 text:Moke barset:break from:02/10/2022 till:06/10/2022 color:TS text:Virgil from:11/10/2022 till:20/10/2022 color:C5 text:Winifred from:16/10/2022 till:18/10/2022 color:TD text:Seven-C from:24/10/2022 till:25/10/2022 color:TD text:Twenty-four-E from:12/11/2022 till:20/11/2022 color:C3 text:Xavier bar:Month width:5 align:center fontsize:S shift:(0,-20) anchor:middle color:canvas from:01/05/2022 till:31/05/2022 text:May from:01/06/2022 till:30/06/2022 text:June from:01/07/2022 till:31/07/2022 text:July from:01/08/2022 till:31/08/2022 text:August from:01/09/2022 till:30/09/2022 text:September from:01/10/2022 till:31/10/2022 text:October from:01/11/2022 till:30/11/2022 text:November TextData = pos:(540,30) text:"(From the" pos:(588,30) text:"Saffir–Simpson Hurricane Scale (SSHS))" The season started off like any other, with Agatha forming in May, which became a Category 2 before striking northwestern Mexico as a remnant low. June: The month of June featured its own triad of cyclones. The first, Blas, strove to be like Sonic the Hedgehog and moved extremely quickly, tearing itself apart in the process. Celia struck Baja California, taking the life of no one, since everyone was prepared for tropical cyclones since the last El Niño. Another storm, tropical depression 4-E, made landfall on Southern Mexico, walloping them with heavy rain for a day and causing flooding. July: July was the beginning of the true activity of this season, with 8 named storms forming that month, the most to form in that month. A month-record 6 of them became hurricanes. Darby, which formed on July 5, became the season's first major hurricane and threatened Hawaii before turning to the north away from the islands. Estelle, which formed on July 8, intensified into the first of four Category 5 hurricanes and ended with the same fate Darby had. Then there came good ole' Frank which caused absolutely no damage despite making landfall as a hurricane. The Central Pacific saw its first two storms as well, with one being named Keli. Lastly, Howard hit Socorro Island as a high-end Category 3 hurricane. August: August saw a slight decrease in activity, with only six named storms forming that month. It, too, would feature a Category 5. Hurricanes Ivette and Javier damaged different land-areas of the Pacific, Ivette Hawaii and Javier Mexico. Madeline became the second Category 5 of the season, the first to hit Hawaii on record, and the first to hit US soil since Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Newton would strike Mexico near hurricane intensity, but it failed to do much damage whatsoever. September: September saw five named storms form. Orlene became the then record-tying third Category 5 of 2022, and lasted for nearly 30 days without crossing into the West Pacific basin, the longest a storm has done so. Paine was the worst hurricane to ever affect the Baja California Peninsula, causing 385 billion pesos ($20.14 billion (2022 USD)) in damage and 110 fatalities. October: October featured three named storms, two of which forming within the month. Moke unexpectedly became a Category 3 hurricane after it couldn't organize itself. Virgil almost became the first tropical cyclone to make landfall on California in nearly a hundred years. Winifred became the most intense ,strongest, and costliest hurricane ever, with world-record 225 mph winds, an 861 millibar pressure, and $142 billion (2022 USD) (2.7 trillion pesos) in damage. It also became the deadliest East Pacific hurricane on record, ending the lives of more than 2,000 people. November: November featured only one named storm, Xavier, which became a major hurricane and dissipated just after making landfall in Mexico. Storms This section is still in progress. Hurricane Agatha On May 14, a tropical wave formed from an area of disturbed weather near Guerrero. This wave became organized quickly, and on May 16, it became Tropical Depression One-E. Early on May 17, it was upgraded to tropical storm status and was given the name Agatha by the NHC. This storm was originally forecast to reach 65 mph, but it strengthened faster than anticipated, and grew to a Category 1 hurricane by the beginning of the 18th. Later that day, Agatha unexpectedly became a Category 2 with 100 mph winds because the storm wanted to. On May 19, it weakened to a tropical storm as it was trying to make landfall on Baja California Sur. This attempt failed, and Agatha sadly weakened into a remnant low on the 20th. On May 21, rather than going straight ahead and making landfall, Agatha instead turned northeast, causing the storm to hit Sinaloa the next day. The storm then dissipated completely. Tropical Storm Blas This was a failure of a storm that stole a good name off the list. Blas formed from an area of low pressure that took 14 days to get from the Caribbean to the East Pacific due to its stubbornness. After crossing into this basin, it nearly dissipated completely before getting its act together five days later. Finally, on June 10, the slow weak snail low pressure area gained a closed center of circulation, prompting an upgrade to a tropical depression. Four hours later, it gained 40 mph winds, so the National Hurricane Center gave it the name Blas. Originally, it was forecast to reach a peak intensity of 70 mph on the 13th, but this never happened because of an incident. On June 12, for whatever reason, Blas decided it would be fun to start moving very fast, and to see how long it would take him to reach Hawaii going that fast. So the storm started moving at lightning speeds. However, this took a toll on the storm's organization, and Blas began to quickly weaken. By June 13, Blas was moving so fast that the storm was practically tearing itself apart, and degenerated to a remnant low with 10 mph winds and a 1020 mbar pressure. Less than 10 hours after that, the storm was so weak it was practically a high pressure system, and dissipated completely. Hurricane Celia This hurricane was similar to Agatha in the fact that it threatened Baja California Sur. The storm formed on June 21 from a large tropical wave that entered the basin four days earlier. The next day, it became Tropical Storm Celia. Celia didn't like that her sister, Agatha, became a Category 2. She thought she was better than her. So, on June 23, she herself became a hurricane and thrived to be a Category 3 so she could beat her sister in strength like all those years before. This never happened. Celia waited so long to become a Category 3, she went in a loop off the coast of Mexico. Celia soon realized that she would be outclassed in strength this time around, but she was smart, and decided to outclass Agatha by actually making landfall on Baja California Sur. By early July 1, Celia, now a tropical storm, made landfall there, and took six hours to go across into the Gulf of California. There, Celia became a remnant low, and dissipated. Tropical Depression Four-E This tropical depression formed on June 28 feeling mad. For whatever reason, Four-E was angry, and he wouldn't hold it in. How did Four-E release his anger, by flooding Mexico! On June 29, Four-E made landfall on Oaxaca, and caused some of their worst floods in years. Due to the size of this storm, Chiapas, Tabasco, and Veracruz also got flooded, destroying many homes in the process. Four-E dissipated on June 30, and finally stopped raining a day after it made landfall. Hurricane Darby Hurricane Darby was the first of many major hurricanes this year. This storm formed on July 5, skipping tropical depression status. This storm went into the perfect El Niño warm waters and became a hurricane less than 2 days after it formed. Darby rapidly intensified to become the season's first Category 3 hurricane on July 8. By this time, the eyewall was rather disorganized, so the storm was downgraded to a Category 2 on July 9, but quickly regained Category 3 status ten hours later. On July 10, Darby strengthened further to a Category 4 hurricane, outperforming all of its counterparts dating back to 1980. Darby was glad that he finally went above 120 mph after all these years. In fact, early the next day, the storm reached a peak intensity of 145 mph winds, beating four of its earlier counterparts by 25 mph. Afterwards, Darby slowly calmed down, and weakened back to Category 3 status on the 13th. This further decreased to below major hurricane strength a day later. This is when Darby, like usual, threatened Hawaii, just because he felt like it. Like usual, his plans to be like Iniki failed, but unlike 2016, Darby completely missed Hawaii to the north. This is where he would weaken to a tropical depression, and dissipate. Hurricane Estelle This storm was similar to Darby, but it became stronger. Estelle formed from a tropical wave that entered the basin on July 3. On that day, the wave split in two, with the southern half becoming Darby. The northern half stayed near Mexico, and formed into Tropical Depression 6-E on July 8. Shortly afterward, it became a tropical storm and was given the name Estelle. The rest of the storm's life was like Darby, but Estelle strengthened to gain Category 5 intensity on July 15 and reached its first peak with 160 mph winds. Estelle then quickly weakened back to a Category 4 due to an eyewall replacement cycle. However, Estelle re-intensified to Category 5 status on July 19 and attained its peak intensity with 170 mph winds. Estelle then threatened Hawaii like her brother Darby, and she too failed to make landfall there. She went north of Hawaii and rapidly weakened to a tropical depression. The storm became a remnant low on July 28, and dissipated. Hurricane Frank The storm named Frank was pretty impatient. He formed as soon as he entered the basin. This is considered unusually far east for a storm to form here. Also, Frank really seemed to like Mexico, he stayed near the coast like the two were old friends. On July 14, Frank really wanted to give Mexico a big hug. But, he had just turned into a hurricane and made landfall on Nayarit. The land caused Frank to quickly weaken and dissipate. No deaths and barely any damage were attributed to the storm due to how friendly he was. Tropical Storm Georgette This tropical storm went in a strange path. It formed on July 13 and was given the name Georgette six hours later. Nearby Hurricane Frank caused this storm to only get 40 mph winds with a 1009 mbar pressure before weakening below that status, and later into a remnant low. The now low pressure area proceeded to circle around Socorro Island without ever making landfall on it. On July 17, Georgette restrengthened into a tropical depression status, and later became a tropical storm again on the 18th. Georgette would reach a peak intensity of 50 mph with a 1005 mbar pressure, narrowly avoid Baja California Sur, and dissipate on July 22. Tropical Depression One-C This storm was forecast to become a powerful hurricane like Darby and Estelle. The tropical wave became Tropical Depression One-C on July 22 with a forecast to reach 125 mph. But, only one hour later, it weakened into a remnant low mysteriously cause One-C just had to be a jerk, and dissipated completely soon after. To this day, One-C is still known as the worst disgrace of a storm that ever existed. Tropical Storm Keli Unlike One-C, Keli lasted for more than one hour and became a tropical storm. Throughout the storm's life, Keli caused no damages and no deaths whatsoever. Hurricane Howard This hurricane formed on July 24 as Tropical Storm Howard. Howard intensified into the 4th hurricane of July thirty-six hours later while approaching Socorro Island. On that day, Howard decided to explode, skipping Category 2 status to become the third major hurricane of the season. Howard proceeded to slam the island with 125 mph winds before rapidly weakening back to a tropical storm due to slightly unfavorable conditions. The hurricane was small, anyway. Howard continued to weaken until becoming a remnant low on July 28. Moisture from the storm's remnants generated thunderstorms over Arizona and California, bringing heavy rain with them. Hurricane Ivette Ivette was a mean girl who decided to take out the Big Island of Hawaii, well, tried to. This storm, which formed in late July 2022, quickly became a Category 4 Hurricane, a level it would reach three times. Ivette almost made landfall on the Big Island as a Category 3, but fortunately weakened to a Category 1 just to show some mercy to the island. This still remains to this day the only hurricane that ever made landfall on the Big Island above 70 mph. As such, the damage was done: $890 million (2022 USD) were attributed to Hurricane Ivette. Due to this storm's impact on Hawaii, the name was retired and replaced with Ivy. Hurricane Javier This hurricane was the exact opposite of Frank. This dude stayed close to Mexico because he wanted to bring a large amount of rainfall on the coast and Baja California. Javier did not like Mexico that much. The storm meandered slowly near Mexico as a Category 2 equivalent hurricane for days on end. Later in the storm's life, Javier weakened to a Category 1, but then strengthened back to a Category 2 until its landfall on Mexico with 100 mph winds. This, at the time, was the costliest storm of the season. Tropical Storm Kay This storm, despite intense outflow from nearby Hurricane Javier, rapidly intensified to reach peak winds of 60 mph before quickly dissipating just as fast as it strengthened. Tropical Depression Three-C This storm only lasted in the Central Pacific basin for a short time before crossing into the West Pacific basin. There, Three-C intensified into a typhoon before making landfall on Japan, then dissipating. Tropical Storm Lester This storm didn't do anything much except bring rainfall to Baja California Sur. This basically just stole a good name off the list and didn't become anything intense. Hurricane Madeline Main Article: Hurricane Madeline If you thought Ivette was scary, think again. This storm not only became the most intense hurricane ever recorded in the Central Pacific basin, but also became the first Category 5 Hurricane to touch American soil in four years, slamming the island of O'ahu (directly over Honolulu) with 165 mph winds. This was the first such instance of a Category 5 making landfall on Honolulu, or anywhere in Hawaii, in the satellite era. This was also the strongest hurricane landfall ever recorded in the Central Pacific, and, until Winifred, was the only 160+ mph landfall in the 2022 Pacific Hurricane Season. Hurricane Madeline was responsible for $36.2 billion (2022 USD) in damage and 78 deaths, greatly eclipsing 2013's Hurricane Manuel to become the costliest storm in ePAC/cPAC history. Hurricane Lala This was the first hurricane of the season to have a Central Pacific name. This storm almost crossed the basin into the wPAC as a tropical cyclone, but weakened to a remnant low before it did. Tropical Storm Newton Tropical Storm Isaac Newton almost reached hurricane status before it made landfall on Mexico. Almost no damages and no deaths were attributed to the storm. Tropical Depression Five-C This was a large storm that attained a low pressure for a tropical depression. Five-C claimed he can go faster than Blas could. So, Five-C took storm speed to the next level, and on August 30 Five-C went over 90 mph while still remaining tropical, shattering the last 70 - 80 mph record. Like what happened to Blas, Five-C was torn apart by the speed, and quickly dissipated. Hurricane Orlene Hurricane Orlene was one of the longest-lived hurricanes in recorded history, lasting for 29 days as a tropical cyclone. Why Orlene decided to stay for so long is a mystery. This storm rapidly intensified to a Category 5 on September 2, and reached its peak intensity of 180 mph. This turned into a quick weakening due to an eyewall replacement cycle. Orlene later weakened to a tropical depression and was forecast to dissipate within four days. However, the tropical depression persisted, and re-attained tropical storm status on September 17. Six days later, Orlene unexpectedly reached hurricane status again before soon weakening below that strength. Finally, on September 29, Orlene transitioned into an extratropical cyclone, which would reach hurricane strength a third time and make four landfalls on Alaska. Hurricane Paine Main Article: Hurricane Paine Paine was a bad boy who devastated the Baja California Peninsula. It formed on September 14 from a New-Mexico-sized area of low pressure which formed two days earlier. The Tropical Depression slowly gained strength throughout the day to become Tropical Storm Paine. Paine was expected to only reach Category 2 strength due to the storm's large size, but unexpectedly began to rapidly intensify on September 16 to gain Category 4 status. Early the next day, Paine reached its peak intensity just below Category 5 strength with an unusually low pressure of 914 millibars. That was also the day Paine made landfall on Baja California Sur while still being a Category 4 hurricane. Paine would weaken slowly afterwards, finally becoming a remnant low on the 20th. The remnants of the storm would cause rain over Arizona and California. Paine was the worst storm to strike the Baja California Peninsula in recorded history, and was the costliest storm to strike Mexico until Winifred came along just a month later. Overall, Paine caused $20.14 billion (2022 USD) in damage, or 385 billion pesos. Hurricane Roslyn Roslyn wanted to be a jerk like Paine, but turned around and became good before it made landfall on Mexico. Why, you might ask, the answer is that I'm don't really know why. Maybe it's because Roslyn saw the destruction Paine did, and decided she didn't want to do that. Roslyn would later, after its landfall on Mexico, Roslyn regenerated into a tropical depression before it dissipated again. Roslyn caused almost no damage and no deaths. Tropical Storm Seymour Seymour did nothing but spin fish around. Yep, that's it. The end. Tropical Depression Twenty-E Twenty-E, like Roslyn, caused almost no damage to Mexico, but did cause one death, sadly. Twenty-E would cross basins and become Hurricane Earl in the Atlantic. Tropical Storm Tina Tina was the weakest tropical storm in existence. Since she was the strongest storm in 1992, Tina decided to be the weakest in 2022. In fact, Tina was so weak that it caused not even a penny in damage and didn't even come close to causing a death, actually, no one was hurt. Hurricane Moke Moke was definitely the biggest win of the season. The tiny storm took days to organize itself, failed multiple times (which explains the weakening to a tropical depression), and finally one day actually became a Category 3 hurricane, defying all of the forecasts. Soon afterwards, Moke would quickly weaken and dissipate because it became disorganized again. The remnants of this storm continued into the West Pacific, and degenerated further into just a circulation on October 15. However, instead of dissipating completely immediately the circulation CONTINUED moving northwest until ultimately dissipating for real on October 18. Tropical Storm Virgil Virgil was the storm that nearly, just NEARLY made a landfall on California as a tropical cyclone. In fact, that's what over half of the computer forecast models, including the GFS themselves, thought he would do. They all thought Virgil would turn into a Category 1 hurricane and make landfall as a strong tropical storm. Virgil, of course, failed to do this, and instead peaked as a tropical storm and weakened to a remnant low before it hit California, east of where he was forecast to go. Hurricane Winifred Main Article: Hurricane Winifred Hurricane Winifred was practically a ruler in her own right. This storm reached an astronomical intensity of 225 MILES PER HOUR with an 861 MILLIBAR PRESSURE! When Winifred made landfall in Manzanillo, it became the strongest landfalling hurricane anywhere in the world because it made landfall at peak intensity! Not even Patricia of 2015 could do such things. But that's not all, Winifred slowly moved southwest over Mexico for 4 days, bringing the worst flooding the country had ever seen. After this, Winifred moved northward and became a major hurricane for a second time before it made landfall in Mazatlán as a Category 2. This only caused even more damage to the already stunned Mexico. Winifred would then weaken and dissipate over the mountains of Mexico. Good mountains. Oh, wait, Winifred didn't dissipate completely just yet, it continued as a remnant low over Texas, then Arkansas, and went all the way through Virginia, exiting into the Atlantic Ocean. This brought bunches of rain to the United States, which just meant even more damage. In total, along with the many records this beast of a storm smashed, $142 billion (2022 USD) in damage (2.7 trillion pesos) and 2,040 deaths were attributed to the storm, making it the costliest and one of the deadliest hurricanes in recorded history. Subtropical Depression Seven-C Seven-C was a subtropical depression that basically did nothing. Tropical Depression Twenty-four-E Twenty-four-E was another tropical depression that hit Mexico even though the country was already trying to recover from previous hurricanes. Thankfully, Twenty-four-E did basically nothing to Mexico. Hurricane Xavier Xavier was the final storm of this crazy and destructive season. He, too, became a major hurricane, as if there weren't enough already. He strove to be like Paine and Winifred and told the people of Mexico his plan of making landfall as a Category 4. The people told him "NO!", and Xavier said back "okay." You see, Xavier was a wimp, and pretty much did what anyone said. So Xavier answered them, by weakening to a tropical depression, and dissipating over Mexico. Xavier's dissipation was the end of the insane 2022 Pacific Hurricane Season, and not a single storm formed until the even crazier season in 2023 as the El Niño intensified. Naming List These were the names used in the Eastern Pacific during the 2022 season. All of the names were the same as in the 2016 season. In April of 2023, the names Javier, Madeline, Paine, and Winifred were retired due to their damages and fatalities. These names were replaced with Jacobo, Melinda, Porter, and Willow. These were the names used in the Central Pacific during the 2022 season. Effects The effects of this season were tremendous, none of the recorded Pacific Hurricane Seasons from before could compare to this one. None of them. Not even 2013 could perform what this season did. Category:Pacific hurricane seasons Category:Active hurricane seasons